


On the Moon's other side

by LittleLinor



Category: Cardfight!! Vanguard
Genre: Bloodplay, Consensual Kink, Knifeplay, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-26 23:31:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16691023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleLinor/pseuds/LittleLinor
Summary: “But Aichi-kun, don’t you want to get back at me for that time I stabbed you at the high school tournament?”





	On the Moon's other side

**Author's Note:**

> An old favourite that I SOMEHOW hadn't posted here until now.
> 
> (Usual disclaimer to please kink responsibly and don't take fic as example)

Ren Suzugamori has always liked challenges.

But there’s challenges, and then there’s Aichi.

It’s hard enough to get him alone (if Kai didn’t find a way to be there, then it’s Tokura or his two little guard dogs, or, in some cases, his sister (and  _that_ ’s one who shows promise, if Ren’s ever seen one)), and harder still to get him alone in the kind of context that can allow for this kind of fun. Really, the only place is Ren’s quarters at the Foo Fighter HQ (or his office, but that implies a higher chance of getting interrupted by Tetsu or Asaka), and you can’t invite someone there without being painfully obvious, which means by definition Aichi’s going to know what he’s after, or the general idea of it anyway. It makes him harder to tease and manipulate, which is such a shame.

But the real problem with Aichi is that as shy and easily flustered as he is in everyday life, he is unshakeable when it comes to important things. And people and relationships, in Aichi’s mind, are important things (as is victory).

Which means it’s impossible to get anything out of him without being serious in turn, and if there’s anything Ren hates, it’s taking things seriously.

(He has his moments. He too has priorities, and he’s done it before, for Tetsu, for Asaka, for Suiko when she was still with them and still remembered them. As much as he loves Aichi, he’s not on the same level of priority, especially after he already almost lost them. And Aichi can defend himself. In general, but against Ren in particular. Aichi doesn’t  _need_  him to be serious, so he doesn’t want to be)

Which leads him to his current dilemna: he’s gotten Aichi in his room for once, but Aichi is, alas, still immune to flirting.

Ren thinks he probably does it on purpose.

“But Aichi-kun, don’t you want to get back at me for that time I stabbed you at the high school tournament?”

(It had been a very nice fight. And a very nice stabbing. Even with his psyqualia proper gone, it had left traces in both of them, in the strength of their images, and he’s sure Aichi felt it as viscerally as he did. Which, if he’s totally honest, had kind of been the point)

Aichi gives him that calm, gentle, infuriating smile.

“But Ren-san, there’s nothing to get back at you for! It was a match, after all, we both did what we had to do to win. I would have done the same if I’d had the chance.”

He pouts.

“But you didn’t.”

“Why,” Aichi asks with a cute tilt of his head, “would you have liked it better if we won and took your place in the tournament?”

“I didn’t say that~”

“Then what  _are_  you saying, Ren-san?”

And he hates it.  _God_ , he hates it, the way Aichi makes absolute sense but knows exactly how to get under Ren’s skin and force him to do and say what he doesn’t want.

But then again, that’s why Aichi gets his blood boiling like no one else. There aren’t a lot of people who can shut him down so effectively, and then  _allow_  him in, if they want, on their own terms.

It’s a unique thrill of something like fear; not the chill he felt when he walked inside HQ and found Suiko reversed, but something both more visceral and less nauseating.

"I’m  _saying_ ,” he finally concedes, affecting as much frustrated boredom as he can to hide the rush at actually having to  _ask_ , “that I’d like to see first-hand how good you can be with a knife.”

"Oh! Well if that’s all—” He interrupts himself with a sheepish laugh. “Ah, but. Do you  _have_  a knife? I don’t carry one with me.”

Of course he does, he wouldn’t have come without being fully prepared if he had even the slightest chance of it working. He pulls it out, still smiling.

"Not everyone agrees to resolve conflicts with cardfights like  _civilised_  people,” he explains.

"I see.”

Ren makes a note to actually start carrying a knife from now on.

“So,” Aichi says with a small smile, sitting next to him, “you want me to cut you.”

And Ren’s brain mentally throws its arms up in a giant “whatever,” because it’s already taken so much scheeming and effort and flirting to get Aichi to this point, and he can set aside some of his kneejerk reaction for a while.

“Don’t be such a tease, Aichi-kun,” he pouts, and he fishes into the pocket of his uniform for his knife. “Here.”

Aichi takes it, weighs it, handles it a little, as if to get a feel for it.

“Shouldn’t you take off your uniform?”

“It’s okay. Red looks good on white, don’t you think? I know how to wash it out.” Or his cleaning staff does, anyway. It wouldn’t be a first. His sheets always come back spotless.

“Ren-san, please take better care of your belongings.” He pauses, then seems to guess what Ren’s going to say next. “And I will not cut the buttons open. My mother would be horrified.”

His sister, most likely, he thinks, but he sighs and opens the buttons of his jacket, then his shirt.

Aichi moves closer (gentle and considerate, as always), and the way he holds the tip of the knife to Ren’s throat is so calm and casual and  _nice_ , it makes the insides of his chest grind, and Ren wishes he was shameless enough to tilt his head back and let Aichi know how good it already feels.

He’s better at it on the other side of the knife. He hasn’t been able to open up to anyone with control over him, not since middle school. Letting them take control, yes. Baring himself? It’s an entire story altogether.

But Aichi  _gets_  him, knows him well enough that he doesn’t need to open up to be laid bare. Nor can he stop it, really.

It’s both exhilarating and terrifying.

“Ren-san?” Aichi asks in a careful, considerate murmur, “would you like to lie down?”

“I think I’m good, thanks.”

“All right.”

And his hand is on Ren’s neck, its fingers circling it to the back, its thumb just barely pressing on the front of his throat. And his knife—his knife is already carving a straight, shallow line down the front of his sternum.

Ren wants to  _moan_.

(He doesn’t. His eyes are still on Aichi’s, and they’re  _dangerous_ , like those he had right before fighting Kai at the top of the Tatsunagi Corporation building. He’s not sure he wants to give that kind of eyes anything to grab on to)

Aichi’s eyes stay on him (“That’s dangerous, Aichi-kun, you should watch where you’re cutting,” but he doesn’t say it; it’d be admitting he’s  _worried_ ) and he angles his knife for a second cut, diagonally across Ren’s chest, dangerously close to the nipple.

“Ren-san,” Aichi murmurs, sounding almost worried, “you should be careful not to move so much,” and that’s when Ren realises he may have shuddered a little. He hadn’t noticed, with how focused he was on Aichi’s eyes and the feeling of Aichi’s knife on his skin. “I wouldn’t want to have to restrain you.”

_Of course you wouldn’t_ , he almost snorts, but he laughs instead, light and flighty, and moans a little when it makes his skin catch on Aichi’s knife—ah, well, can’t be helped.

“Well, you could! I’m not stopping you.”

“Do you want to?”

Ah, yes, that’s what it comes back to, isn’t it? But Ren’s never been good at knowing what he  _really_  wants, except for the most important things (Power. Safety. The safety of his friends, too. Their presence at his back, anchoring him). Psyqualia had been a welcome relief: he still didn’t know what exactly he wanted, but it hadn’t mattered because he always got it anyway.

(Except for love. Except for the ability to  _trust_. Even psyqualia hadn’t been able to give him that, and trying to force it to had backfired in the most painful way and caused him to be abandoned, alone with all this power that hadn’t even fulfilled its goal)

Love, at least, he had found, later, when he allowed Psyqualia’s grip on his mind to weaken. Love had found its way to him in those who trusted  _him_ , and for once he had learned on time how to protect it.

But entrusting himself to someone, that’s something different, something he’s never really been able to do. And maybe that’s what he wants after all. To let go of that control, for once. To let go of that control and have it not  _matter_. To still be himself, even when the world isn’t eating from his hand.

“Maybe,” he whispers seductively in Aichi’s ear, pressing closer to him, with the knife and all (Aichi’s hand on his throat allows him), “maybe I want you to  _make_  me surrender.”

"But Ren-san,” Aichi smiles back, “that’s already what I’m doing.”

And that,  _that_  is what makes him shudder for real, the same groundless sensation as when he fainted after that fight all those years ago, when he fell and Kai’s hands held him back (and then never again, because when he woke, still dazed from psyqualia’s aftermath and the feeling of safety that had envelopped him, they were gone). 

Aichi’s hand is on him now, still, carefully wrapped around his throat, but for how long—how long until it drops him as soon as he’s bared himself enough?

_Aichi wouldn’t._ He’s fought to bring Ren back, already. To bring  _Kai_  back, even after he almost destroyed the world, fought not to stop him but to force him not to destroy himself, ruthless and merciless and painfully compassionate.

Aichi is the kind of person who would stab you through the heart without faltering, if it could save you in the long run.

—he trusts him. It runs through him like a shiver, this sudden knowledge. Aichi’s seen his worst and didn’t give up on him, and that means he would trust him even if he was holding a knife to his throat (which, coincidentally, he was doing a minute ago). All that’s left is to let him.

But ah, that’s the real battle, isn’t it?

It takes most of his strength to keep his voice level, not the casual tone he uses for everything, important or not, but something more honest, that he’s only let a couple of people hear.

“Cut me, Aichi-kun,” he asks while he’s still close enough to his ear. “Please.”

Aichi’s thumb rubs the front of his neck, almost tenderly.

“See? That’s better, isn’t it?”

And this time when he cuts, it’s on his stomach, where Ren’s muscles are still tense with apprehension. He keeps his eyes down, faint, serene smile on his face, but the gentle rubbing of his thumb on Ren’s neck keeps a constant presence—if a suffocating one. Ren breathes in deeply. Breathes out. The trail of Aichi’s knife is like a line of fire on his skin, burning at his surface, almost teasing. He knows, without looking, that Aichi’s barely scraped the skin, a cut just deep enough to make blood bead at its surface, but too shallow otherwise.

” _Aichii—_ “ he whines out, half pout and half pleading desperation, and then Aichi interupts him, saving him from his omission ("Please don’t move, Ren-san”), lifts his knife to bring it a bit higher, just under the first rib of his cage, and cuts, for real this time, enough that Ren can feel the slight shift in tension at his surface through the pain—and  _that_  makes him moan—and to hell with it, if he’s going to be made to moan, he’s going to be utterly shameless about it.

He isn’t a shy flower whose pleasure has to be patiently coaxed out. He is Ren Suzugamori, and he has dealt and felt much worse than this.

Surrender is far preferable to shame. 

So when Aichi brings his knife up to cut along the next rib, he closes his eyes and lets himself cry out, drawn out and blissful, head tilted back into Aichi’s hold.

” _Aaaa~_ ”

Aichi chuckles, and cuts a third time, above the two others.

And it feels so  _good_ , being held and split open like that, not having to worry about anything. Just Aichi’s hand on his throat and Aichi’s knife making its way through his skin. It feels like he could just float away, guided by the buzz of pain slowly spreading from the cuts to his entire body. 

Aichi grips his ponytail and something jerks him back to reality, twisting uncomfortably in his stomach.

“Not the hair,” he breathes, hoping Aichi will hear, but also not draw attention to it. He doesn’t want to address it right now, doesn’t want to fall back out of this feeling.

Aichi lets go, cups his jaw in his hand instead.

“All right.”

The moment passes. The knot soothes itself out, leaving a kind of limp, relieved weakness in its wake. He lets his face rest into Aichi’s hand, realises he’s giving more than he’d planned.

Realises he doesn’t care.

“Would you mind keeping your head up, then?” Aichi asks, tilting his face up with the hand on his jaw, and Ren smiles a little and does.

Aichi’s knife is back at his throat.

And surprisingly, that feels less threatening than what he felt a minute ago, even when the tip grazes his skin and leaves a mark. He breathes in slowly, focuses on the blade moving accross his skin, like a slightly burning caress. It trails across his throat in slow, lazy zigzags, only stopping at the hollow at the base of his throat.

He takes in a shaky breath, feels Aichi press just a little. Feels the very tip move into his skin, but nothing deeper, nothing more. Closes his eyes.

“Ren-san.”

Aichi’s voice is quiet, almost a murmur. Asking for some kind of acknowledgement.

“Yes,” he answers, and doesn’t know whether to be scared or elated when the movement makes the knife move with him, just a little.

“Are you scared?” he asks, and his knife moves again to press across Ren’s throat, just under his jaw.

Ren smiles.

“You’re too nice for that, Aichi-kun.”

Aichi laughs.

“Maybe.”

He knows he’s right. Aichi loves  _power_ , but he wouldn’t harm someone who didn’t do anything wrong (not that he’s never done anything wrong, but those things aren’t relevant to the subject at hand. If Aichi still held rancor for what happened in the past, he wouldn’t be here right now).

Now,  _hurt_  him for acting so full of himself? That’s an entire story altogether. And Ren knows he’s one of the only people Aichi would show that side to.

And right on cue, breath still puffing with slight, silent laughter, Aichi cuts a shallow line along the underside of his jaw.

“I take it you don’t want me to touch your face?” he asks in his sweetest tone.

“Ah,” Ren answers, just a little shaky, “yes. Asaka would never let me hear the end of it. And Tetsu might hate you a little.”

“What a shame.” He gathers the blood dripping from it with his fingertip, and Ren opens his eyes on time to see him smile and lick it, and  _oh_ ,  _that’_ s a side of Aichi even  _he_  hadn’t seen before, and he really wouldn’t mind seeing it again because that’s one of the most attractive things he’s ever seen. It’s pretty much on par with his eyes shining with psyqualia’s glow, and god knows  _that_  still brings butterflies to his heart and bloodlust to his gut.

“Aichi-kun, you should do that more often. It suits you.”

“Should I do it again, then?”

“Yes~”

Pain slices across his stomach. He breathes in sharply, restrains the urge to double up, keeps himself stable with Aichi’s hand locked around his jaw.

_Oh_ , he thinks,  _that’s probably deeper than before._  The muscles of his stomach are spasming slightly, buzzing with weakness at least as much as pain. And his breath—his breath is coming shaky, feels too light for his lungs.

_Good going, Aichi-kun._

Aichi puts his knife down and gathers Ren’s blood on his fingertips, first just the index, then the two next fingers too. It runs on his hand as he brings it up to hastily lick it off before it can fall everywhere, and Ren’s never seen something so beautiful before. Bright red and bright blue striking against Aichi’s skin, and the little blood still smeared on his face even after he brings his hand down.

He thinks he might have moaned at the sight.

Aichi smiles.

“Was that nice?”

“Yes~”

“Good,” he says, toying with Ren’s cut a little, making him cry out and shudder. “I think we should stop here.”

Ren blinks.

“Whaaat?” And then pouts, when he regains enough control of his face. “Why?”

“You’re trembling, Ren-san.” Is he? Oh, right, he is. Pretty badly, at that. Figures. “You’ve been trembling for a while.”

“Isn’t that what you wanted?”

“A bit,” Aichi concedes. “But still,” he adds, still playing with what little he can reach of Ren’s flesh, pushing his point by making him cry out in pain, “I think we should save this for next time.” He smiles, and Ren can see the light in his eyes when he opens his again. “We can go further then.”

And Ren might be contrary by nature, but he doesn’t want to argue against the idea of a next time, so he nods.

And sighs, because now he’s not being pushed even further, he has an image to keep.

“Ah, well. I guess that’ll have to do.”

He definitely doesn’t snuggle a little when Aichi smiles and pulls his head to his shoulder.


End file.
